Village life - do I really get to live here?!

Christy got to travel to a local village with a friend of hers on Tuesday of this week. There are about 800-1000 people who live here. It's only about 1.5hours by bus from our city so it's easily accessible. It was a VERY cold and dreary day, with a threat of snow, but we bundled up, put on our rain boots, headed out and had a very fruitful day.

This is a picture of the village. The yellow things in the trees are piles of corn drying.

Amazing, huh? How do they get it up there?!

Here is a family hard at work in their courtyard. This is a large, but typical style, home. There may be one or more families living here. Most of the homes have a front door that opens to a spanish style courtyard in the center of the home (no roof) with all the rooms off the edges. Quaint!

More of the village off the main road

A beautifully handcrafted window in a home

We walked into the main gathering place in the village to discover preparations for a wedding feast!! They were hard at work to prepare for the 900 expected guests!!!

Two of the four pigs we saw being slaughtered.

The meat was actually steaming because it was SO fresh! I thought it had just been cooked or something but my friend pointed out that it was smoking because the meat was a warm 98 degrees and it was about 40 degrees outside!

HARD work!! They were pulling and tugging and it took two men to carry the meat after it was removed from the bone.

Headless pics and a gutted goat

Oh, there are the heads!! Sitting right next to the pot of tea, chives and intestines (or brain - not sure...)

And here is that gutted goat. He smiled for the camera :) There are a total of three heads and one body in this picture. Didn't see the other bodies....perhaps it was a three-headed goat

A group of volunteers sitting around waiting to be called to wash and cut veggies

Let the games begin!

My friend talking to the ladies about washing the veggies.

Water buffalo - used to carry things and for milk, not for dinner.

Some sweet old ladies that invited us to come to the wedding to watch them dance the next day! We told them we couldn't come so they invited us to their home instead.

My friend getting a good laugh in

Here we are in their home surrounding a coal fire pit, watching them cross stitch and eating sunflower seeds

Aren't they amazing?

More corn drying

This is what they do with the corn after it dries out and they harvest the kernels - they use it for firewood! Which is how we kept warm while we told stories to a lady and her children

A door to a home, lady with a baby on her back

More corn!

This village was particularly beautiful because of the drawings on the walls of the buildings. Looks as though these people are worshiping the tree? Perhaps...

Man with goats. This was before we found the slaughtered ones. But I think these are just cousins.

Frustrations and Feelings

Tonight I started dinner at about 5:30. By 7:30 we were finally sitting down to eat; however, I could not finish my food because it tasted like the dead sea....apparently I used too much chicken boullion when making the "from scratch" cream of chicken soup. So, 3 chicken breasts, 8 handmade tortillas, 1 cup of cheese, 3 tomatoes, 1 bulb of garlic and half an onion went into the trash. Along with two hours of labor in the kitchen, away from my kids, all the while making a nice pile of dishes for my sweet helper in the morning. ARRRGGGHHH!! SO frustrating.

I usually keep Campbell's Cream of Chicken on hand but I used it up this weekend and thought that making it from scratch couldn't be that difficult. It was super easy, but the boullion bag was written in characters and unfortunately after 6 months of language study I still cannot read.

David was out at one of the 4 stores he visited tonight, all in a effort to buy: hamburger buns, whipping cream and milk. His first stop was Walmart - the place to get anything and everything you need, right? nope. They had NOTHING. Not one item on this list. SO he headed off to the two trusty import stores. One had one item, the other had the other item. Neither carries the milk we like. He finally came home at 7:30 only to sit down to this nasty dinner. Poor guy. He's really taken up the slack with this pregnancy. He does ALL the shopping now. After dinner he told me he was going out to HoMart to see if they had milk. Sure enough - of ALL places - they had the High Calcium, Low Fat milk we like!!!! This is also the place, if you'll recall, that carries my powdered creamer occasionally. I am lovin' me some HoMart!!!

As I was reading to Hannah David came in the room and I told him I was so frustrated that we cannot just go to one store and buy everything we need. He said he was frustrated that we couldn't just go to one park and play on a single patch of grass. I thought that was ridiculous! If I had to choose between and SuperTarget and a patch of grass, guess which one I would choose! I offered that scenario to him to which he replied, "The grass, of course!" .....WHAT?!?! Is he crazy?!

No, he's not crazy. If a patch of grass means as much to him as a superstore does to me then I totally get it. We all have things on this side of the world that really get to us; that if it just wasn't this way life would be SO much easier. For me, it's the shopping. For David, it's the grass.

As I was pondering this I realized: how selfish am I? Some people live in a world where they don't have to plan their trips to 4 different stores to buy what they need because they don't HAVE 4 different stores to choose from! Some have one. Some have none. Some buy everything they need at the market. Some people make cream of chicken soup, sour cream, coffee creamer, butter, cheese and syrup from scratch ALL.THE.TIME. And some don't even have electricity to do it. Or internet to write blogs to complain about it. How selfish am I....

I am thankful for where I live. I am thankful that moments like these cause me to step back and reevaluate my thinking. I am thankful for my 4 stores. I am thankful for my amazingly selfless husband. I am thankful for internet and electricity. I am thankful for perspective.

As long as I have access to Campbell's I'm not sure I will attempt the "from scratch" kind again, but I wouldn't be surprised if one day I find myself in the place I described above: only the market to shop from, no electricity to cook with and no internet to tell you all about it. Would it be worth it? You bet. And you know what? I bet we'd have grass instead.

Chick-Fil-A for dinner

We've really been missing us some Chick-Fil-A. Really. It's the ONLY thing I have craved and actually cried over not having. But cry now more!! I found a recipe for Chicken Sandwiches that come pretty close to the original. I altered it a little (when do I EVER NOT alter a recipe?!) to make it work for our family - mainly turned it into strips not sandwiches.

Here is the recipe:

I know lots of us are from the south and REALLY miss Chik-Fil-A. DebbieM sent me this recipe for a copycat Chik-Fil-A recipe for chicken breasts, but you could use it for chicken nuggets, too. Debbie's notes:

"I used regular Sundrop oil (couldn’t find peanut oil, but I know they have it here!) I used 4 chicken breasts (cut a little of the skinny side off.) You can definitely make more than that! The salt in the flour mixture sounds like too much. It was really OK. It was not too salty. The powdered sugar was a surprise!! I used a thermometer to see the oil temp. Sadly, mine doesn’t go to 375 so I had to guess if it was right. I double dipped the chicken like it mentioned. That was a good idea…make it very crunchy.

When I put the lid on the pressure cooker, it would not close all the way. It still was good and definitely kept the oil from spraying all over the place. I cooked for 4 minutes. Oh, there was plenty of flour mixture and milk/egg to fry more. I really wished that I had made more…they were good!!"

3 cups Peanut oil

1 Egg

1 cup Milk

1 cup Flour

2-1/2 Teaspoons Powdered sugar

1/2 Teaspoon Pepper

2 Tablespoons Salt

2 Skinless, boneless chicken breasts, halved

4 Plain hamburger buns

2 Tablespoons Melted butter

8 Dill pickle slices

Mix together the egg and milk. Place the filets in this mixture, and let

sit for at least an hour.

While the breasts are sitting, mix together the flour, sugar, pepper, and

salt.

Once the sitting is done, dredge in the flour. (For ourselves and our

favourite customers, after the first dredging, we would put them back in the

milk bath for a few seconds, and re-dredge! This is not company policy,

however!)

Place the Peanut oil in a deep fat fryer, and bring up to a high heat.

Once up to 375 F., gently drop into the oil, and let cook until golden

brown. (This is for those of us who do not have a pressure cooker. If you

do, follow the note below!)

Note: Chick-Fil-A actually uses a Pressure Cooker to cook the Filets in. If

you have one, use the peanut oil according to the instructions for frying in

it. Desired heat is 400 F. Place chicken in it and put the lid on. Cook for

about 3-4 Minutes. Be VERY careful removing the lid…you have to make sure the steam is released.

Lightly butter the buns, and grill until heated through. Place two

pickles on each bun, and place a hot breast on each!

SO, I cut my 4 breasts into strips. Keep them thin. I double dipped mine too - like she suggests. Here is my suggestion on that: double or triple your flour mixture (I doubled mine and it was just barely enough). Divide your tripled amount into two bowls. That way you will have a fresh mixture to dip into when you are half-way through your strips. The first bowl gets a little chunky and won't stick to the chicken if you don't do this and you are double dipping. If you choose not to double dip you may only need one bowl - I dunna know. I used peanut oil. It was my first time :) It smelled a little bit like peanut butter which was not a turn on, but perhaps if you live in the states and not in Asia you can get some really great peanut oil that might work for you. I know Chick-Fil-A uses peanut oil. I used a regular old frying pan with lots of oil to fry them up. Each batch took about 8 minutes.

We'll have to try the sandwiches some night too, cause I think the buttered bun and pickles would just make this meal perfect! Also, some of that AWESOME honey roaster bbq sauce that they have - if someone could ship me some of those I would be a VERY happy pregnant woman :)

How the belly muscles weaken with each baby....

12 weeks with Hannah

14 weeks with Jacob

12 weeks with #3

first trimester - OVER!

I am 12 weeks and 3 days along now. I feel every bit of it too! Thankfully I am not nauseous AT ALL and only a little tired. I don't require a 2 hour nap and a 7:30 bed time anymore, although I def sneak in that nap and go to bed at a reasonable hour, most of the time.

I want to post my most recent picture but before doing so I need to clarify something: Please know that I totally realize that in the two previous pictures I look anything BUT pregnant! I did not take those to show you the pregnant belly, but just to show where I came from and what my ultimate goal is when this is all said and done next year....!! Those were just "starting point" pics.

Okay, so here is it. You should notice some changes. BTW, I "suck it in" in each of these pics to show what is really there.....

In other news, our Christmas was wonderful. Different, but good. We enjoyed having just the four of us together for a slow relaxed morning. Two of our most treasured packages did not arrive in time for Christmas morning (we are actually STILL waiting) so that put a damper on things, but we still enjoyed our time celebrating Christmas as a family. We had Grandma's coffee cake and bacon for breakfast while chatting with the entire gang in NY. We ate kraft macaroni and cheese for lunch, then made an apple pie, took naps, and cooked chicken cordon bleu for dinner. We ate the pie while wrapping up our day with a family movie night.

Here are a few pics of the fun:

Is it almost vacation time?

January 26 can't get here soon enough. That's the day we leave for the beach. Lately I've been feeling like I am SO over this whole study language 40 hours a week thing. Honestly, it's not been 40 hours a week. At least not for me. I basically go to class, review, prepare for the next class and sleep in between. I just don't have the energy to do much else. And I am losing interest. It's hard to stay committed to such a long term goal. Usually my goals are semester oriented. Not so when you are learning one of the world's toughest languages.

In other news, take a look at this cute little catepillar....

Adorable, huh?

Yeah, adorable. Except that this is where I found him.....

That would be my dinner. Or what was left of it anyways. This little guy was not alive. He had been washed in soapy water and boiled until he was stiff and lifeless, left to rot on my final piece of broccoli. Now, I wasn't exactly hungry for dinner tonight. This definitely convinced me to be done.

And apparently our son can recite the names of his classmates. Keep in mind that each child has about three names...He also speaks to them in the local language when playing with them. This does wonders for encouraging us in our language learning....He's gonna have to be our translator!!!

Here's a photo of Hannah looking oh-so-interested in her Christmas performance. She knew every word to every song yet didn't sing a single one. At least she looked cute in her Christmas dress....

9weeks

Amazingly enough I AM sucking it in for this picture. Someone asked me today if I had broken out the maternity pants yet - not quite, but it won't be long. For now and rubberband is doing the trick!